30 Years – books, Books, BOOKS!
I grew up in the Chicagoland area but chose to live somewhere else. My reasons were simple, but it doesn’t mean that I don’t miss the area. So, I come up occasionally to see my family and friends. Sadly, I get nothing done when I’m here because there is always somewhere to go, someone to see, and something to buy. Add in the traffic, and the painting that should appear explains why I haven’t returned. This area is not conducive to writing. If I don’t write; I get disgruntled.
Why am I here and posting about Chicago and books when I am supposed to be working on Tesla’s Travels? It’s Printers Row Lit Fest (June 8th, June 9th), and I will be going with my editor and a few amazing friends to buy books. Yes, I love books and will be searching for: French authors, Japanese authors, and the Redwall Series (a friend and I are collecting then rereading the series for nostalgic purposes). If you have any author suggestions, shoot me an email! We will all be there on Sunday.
So, I will explain why I am looking for French and Japanese authors. Part of my writer training is to read entire traditions of literature. This was a growth exercise handed down from Dr. Niculescu during one of our lunches. It is simple, how can you write in a tradition of literature without experiencing that tradition. So, I began reading the classic authors in American literature (because I write in that tradition). However, he ended his exercise with a suggestion: read other traditions and you will be able to write in multiple forms.
That is the exercise, and I decided to absorb the Japanese and French traditions into my Being. French is simple, I can read anything (as in enjoy it) French, digest it and love it. For me, the story never matters in French writing, it’s their underlying philosophical currents that pull me down like a undertow. It may come as a surprise (not really if you read any of my manuscripts), but I study French philosophy more than German.
Then there is the Japanese tradition I will read. I am currently reading The Sailor who Fell from Grace with the Sea by Yukio Mishima. My reasons for reading this tradition are slightly different from the others. I want to get a world view, and books allow me to be transported to a different culture and different time period (Light in August just took me to Mississippi during the early 1930’s). Japanese authors, like any author, are writing about what they know and what is important to them. These differences are clear in the first chapter of The Sailor who Fell from Grace with the Sea. Which means, I will soon be in Japan post WWII, and I am excited and scared!
If I am lucky, and my ideas about this festival are correct, then I am going to get some great books at amazing prices.
Oh, and while I was home I decided to print out Journey to God single spaced, click this post to see a picture.
Progress Report for June 1, 2014
On Friday, I noticed pain in my left hand while typing and it kept getting worse. So, I took the weekend off as a mini vacation and iced it. Instead of writing, I began outlining two short stories, prepping short stories to go to magazines tomorrow, reviewed an arc in Tesla’s Travels, and played pool and had some beers with friends. Also did a little editing for a great friend of mine and read the bulk of Light in August. Still haven’t heard from the agent who has my current treatment. That means, I will begin prepping a new treatment to go out in two weeks.
As far as Tesla’s Travels goes, I am now sitting at 33371 words and 22 chapters. Since Sunday, I have written 8156 words. It is slow moving, but I think I can have the initial draft done by mid June; if I increase my pace.
Progress Report for May 25, 2014
Oh joy, a week has already passed me by, and I still am not into the full swing of writing. Instead of writing from Tuesday to Thursday, I went out with friends and practiced presentations for a workshop. Everything with the workshop went off without a hitch and it was well received (collaboration tools and how to use these tools to improve student engagement in in an online course). Since I lost that time, I decided to stay in this weekend and work as much as I could on Tesla’s Travels. I wrote a lot over the last couple of days and like how the story is coming together. Also, I finally got to the point where my personal dreams (like nighty night dreams, not aspiration types of dreams) are completely based in the story. Which isn’t that great, because Tesla’s Travels is a frightening world to be a part of.
Either way, the current word count is: 25215. That means, I wrote 10,800 words in the last week. The goal is to hit my old stride which is about 5,000 – 7,000 a day. Otherwise, I will miss my deadline for the middle of June.
A Suggestion from an IT Professional
After my bachelors program, I worked in IT (it was strange since I studied philosophy and sociology). Soon after starting, I was absorbing as much as I could about computers and IT infrastructure. It took me a short period of time to understand the systems and understand the faults with corporate network architecture. Nonetheless, I built a home lab and run about five different servers for my home office. This was designed for training purposes, but I applied best practices to my home. One of those best practices is having UPS (battery/surge protector) to protect and keep your computer online in case of a power outage. Being an impoverished writer and graduate student, I can’t afford 100 dollars for my desktop computer that runs my servers. While I have the money, the reason I wont buy one is for a different reason.
I have a laptop. If you want to avoid losing your data during a power outage, but don’t want to spend money on a UPS, use your laptop as your primary writing computer (it comes with a surge protector and battery in case of a power outage). You also have a small screen making it harder to see notifications from social media.
I decided to offer this little tip, because I have lost work in the past due to a power outage. Those documents were not related to my writing. Now, I know myself very well. When I write something, I write it and say, “Awesome! That story is done!” So if a power outage wiped out my files and corrupted one of my manuscripts I know I wouldn’t go back and rewrite it. It would be lost to the ages. Luckily, I am paranoid and designed my infrastructure to mitigate any disasters that could happen (all document files are automatically backed up across three computers, a raid 5 NAS, and onto a server with my website host). No matter how impoverished you are, make sure to protect your data from loss. I doubt many people would rewrite a manuscript after it was destroyed. If you can’t afford fancy computers and things, just get a thumb drive and make sure your files are replicated on the thumb drive and your hard drive after a session. That way you have at least two copies in case one fails (you can use a service like dropbox, but I suggest you read the terms and services so you don’t end up indebted to a company).
Website Modifications and Tesla’s Travels
I have made some modifications to the site’s categories. I removed all the of the different short story categories, because they were outdated and not really used. Categorizing my work is probably the hardest thing to do. Also, I added a few categories, the main one is the Project’s Progress Update. This is for manuscripts or short stories. Over summer, I will be releasing a update weekly on Sunday (this is the first one). These updates will show progress on what I am currently working on. For example, this shows the change in the word count for Tesla’s Travels.
Water, tea, tea, water, water, water coffee, water, water, tea, tea, tea, water, water, coffee, and then water till bed was my drinking schedule yesterday. That led to a high level of production and pushed the current status of Tesla’s Travels to 14415 words. I didn’t get a chance to work on the project during the week because of Time, and work. However, I set Saturday aside and got a ton done. (Insert information about Sunday’s progress).
My Situation – State of Affairs
Since I am in a graduate program, I go through cycles of productivity based on my work load in my MBA program. My summer break has begun as of today. With this new found freedom – I still have to work for my graduate assistantship – I will be able to devote all available hours to writing. At the moment, I can’t walk or hike long distances due to a problem with my lower back. I am in rehabilitation, but I can’t go hiking, camping, or rock climbing. That means I have an abundance of time to read and write. Based on my current writing pace during my finals, I will finish Tesla’s Travels by the end of June. In the coming months, I plan to give an overarching overview at least once a month. Lastly, tomorrow marks the third week since Journey to God arrived at an agent’s office. Wish me luck!
New Short Story: Time
It has been awhile since I released a short story. Personally, I find writing a manuscript more fulfilling because of the details I can add to the story. However, sometimes you get bitten by the bug and decide to write something that pops into your mind. This piece hit me while I was rabbit sitting my friend’s bunny. Luckily, I had my computer on me and half a battery. Two hours later, the rough draft was done. Another hour, and the second draft was edited. A couple of emails between me and my editor, and the final piece was complete. Here is an excerpt from Time my new short story:
“I’m next, John!” John had fallen asleep leaning against a golden pole with red velvet ropes. His new found friend grabbed him by the shoulder and shook him awake.
With a startle, John popped to attention, “What? Where, what, are we there, uh—”
The man interrupted John’s disjunctive questioning, “You dozed off again. You know you don’t have to sleep anymore.”
Research and More Research
“Whoa there ol’ girl.” is what I have been saying to myself the last week. Which is slightly odd, because I am a boy and not a girl. But, the reason I have been talking to myself, while pacing my hallways, was Tesla’s Travels. I love this story, and already know it will be an amazing journey. However, there are a lot of little things that need to be well researched so they flow well. So, I stopped writing Tesla’s Travels for the last week and just focused on researching. This wasn’t happy fun research, this was frightening research, because I explored how humans can make perfectly logical decisions that would lead to atrocious acts. Now that the reading’s are over, I have am back on the Tesla bandwagon. As of today, the piece broke: 7111 words.
Tesla’s Travels – Its Own Page
There is a new page in the manuscript section: Tesla’s Travels. This will be a place that is updated once a month with information about the book. Since it is being written, this page will mostly be used to mark its progress and give a synopsis. The issue with the synopsis is simple. This is a working title, that means that it can change drastically as I work through it. Yes, there are ten pages (18″ x 24″) of outlined notes, demographic data, character development, but most of these are “hard plot points”. That means that they have to happen otherwise it will negatively impact the four other stories. Even with ten pages, these only define major events for the main plot line. That means the book is still amorphous and time will be the determining factor in the whole story. So, other than the hard plot points, everything and anything can change while I work on the piece.
Net Neutrality and My Paranoia
Over the last week everyone has been like a bee, abuzz, with the implications of net neutrality. I don’t think the majority of our population even understands that there is a war transpiring over the internet. So, I figured I would take the time to explain why I personally care.
There are two major reasons for my concern: 1) my website, and 2) other websites like mine. First, lets set up an analogy that we can use for the internet. Imagine that the internet is a finite bundle of pipes and each pipe is currently equal in size. Understand, that if there is no net neutrality, it means major businesses can pay internet service providers to engorge their pipes. Well, since it is a finite amount of pipes, the business is now allocated more pipes while the rest of the internet has to run on what is left (realistically they would be given preferential priority and not a dedicated line to your home). That means that it takes longer for you, the consumer, to reach that non-paying website since they can’t pay for a larger pipe. This is great for companies like NetFlix who devour a massive amount of bandwidth for their streaming services. Since they have the money, they would pay to get faster speeds to your home which improves their product for the end consumer. Using their larger pipe, they could create a large barrier to enter the streaming media industry.
So, that means if you try to access my website it will take longer to load. Why is that an issue? Well, as a society we have become more impatient and demand things to be ready immediately. With that entitlement, imagine waiting ten seconds for a website to appear? Then you click and wait another ten seconds. No one would stick around to view that website, and that would make those ten seconds a death sentence! Now, my website is payed for by me. I foot the bill, and I refuse to allow advertising. That means, I will not be paying to expand my pipe. My hosting company may, which would be awesome, but I doubt they have the money to compete with NetFlix or Amazon. That echos for all the other websites that are small and make meager profits. I am talking about web comics, Wikipedia , research websites (my university’s library that I use to research for my books), and other universities websites. That is my issue with the topic. I would like this website to be equally viewable to everyone. If the changes purposed go through, that may not be the case. If you are interested, trust me, there are a lot of sources that can explain it better than I did. I am not a journalist, and this is my personal interpretation based on what I have read. If anything is not correct, contact me and send me a source explaining the misinformation.